BREAKING NEWS: OBAMA……..

I’m sure many of you haven’t been able to stay away from all of the controversy surrounding President Obama lately. The President is under fire for, of all things, swatting a fly during an interview with CNBC a couple of days ago. MSNBC’s coverage of this cracks me up, I have attached the “Breaking

BREAKING NEWS!!!!

News” screen shot to the right. Apparently the folks over at MSNBC have nothing to report on now-a-days.

The “controversy” really started when PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) lambasted Obama for his cruelty. Give me a break!!!!! If PETA wants to ever be taken seriously then they should quit behaving in such a childish manner. I’m sure no one in PETA has ever swatted a fly! PETA actually wasted their time by holding a press conference, releasing a statement to the media and mailing Obama a “humane” fly catcher.

I feel bad for even writing a story about this; in doing so am I not stooping to the level of MSNBC? This non-story ranks right up there with what type of dog the Obama’s would get or what type of animals the Bush’s had. Who flippin cares!? Is this news?

— Clayton

Tennessee Republican Senate Aid Reprimanded

A Tennessee GOP Senate aid was reprimanded recently for sending an email depicting the portraits of all of the presidents, from George Washington to

Presidential portraits from email

Barack Obama. The trouble is, the image she sent depicts all of the past presidents with official portraits, until you get to Barack Obama’s portrait. Obama is pictured simply as two eyes on a black background.

The fact that this lady was reprimanded is hardly enough punishment; if anything she should be removed from her post. I call on Senator Diane Black to do the right thing and find someone else to serve as her aid. Of course according to Senator Black, Ms. Goforth has always been a friend to “people with black skin.” Yeah, one of those friends who are nice to your face, then talk about you behind your back, or so it seems to me.

Ms. Goforth’s apology for her sending this racially charged email is not enough; and her explanation is simply absurd.

Ms. Goforth states:

“I want to offer my deepest apology regarding the offensive nature of the e-mail forwarded to several of my colleagues,” wrote Goforth.  “I also want to make it clear that it was forwarded to me from an acquaintance with absolutely no political party ties and who is outside the Tennessee Capitol Hill arena. I should have deleted it upon receipt. Again, I am deeply sorry and offer a sincere apology to anyone offended.”

In another portion of Ms. Goforths statement she states that she “accidentally sent the email to wrong people”.

Ms. Goforth should have not sent it at all; whatever happened to just hitting delete. And “sending it to the wrong people”? Does she have “correct” people who she regularly sends racially inappropriate emails?

Goforth also points out that she got the message as a forward from someone else; and I care why?  What does that change?

What do you think should happen to Ms. Goforth as punishment?

— Clayton

Obama Health Care, Change You Can Believe In?

As many of you have seen in the news lately, a new health care plan is moving through Congress as we speak. Millions of Americans are without health care, either because they can’t afford it or because they are deemed high risk by the insurance companies. There is no question that the current system needs to be changed, but this way?

Have any of you thought to question this plan at all, have any of you wondered why a lot of the big name health insurance and pharmaceutical companies favor this government mandated system? Nearly all of the Congress members who are playing a large role in shaping our health care plan are in the pocket of these very companies they claim to be protecting us from. This list was taken from an Associated Press report that seems to have been conveniently missed by the main stream media….

Jackie Clegg Dodd, the wife of Sen. Chris Dodd, the lawmaker in charge of writing the Senate’s version of the bill, sits on the board of four health care companies. Democrats Jay Rockefeller and Tom Harkin, in addition to Dodd, also have ties to the healthcare industry.

The wife of Senator Chris Dodd is on the boards of Javelin Pharmaceuticals Inc.,  Brookdale Senior Living, Cardiome Pharma Corp. and Pear Tree Pharmaceuticals. Financial documents show that she is the most highly compensated non-employee members of the board for Javelin Pharmaceuticals. How can Senator Dodd, who is in charge of this bill, be impartial, as his wife gets the majority of her income from these companies?

To quote the AP “…she earned $32,000 in fees and $109,587 in stock option awards last year, according to the company’s SEC filings. Mrs. Dodd earned $79,063 in fees from Cardiome in its last fiscal year, while Brookdale Senior Living gave her $122,231 in stock awards in 2008, their SEC filings show. She earned no income from her post as a director for Pear Tree Pharmaceuticals but holds up to $15,000 in stock in Pear Tree, which describes itself as a development-stage pharmaceutical company focused on the needs of aging women.”

This is simply ridiculous!! Why not have a panel write and sponsor this bill, instead of Senator Dodd? Of course Senator Dodd, as well as other members of Congress have cause for concern as the story has been barely mentioned in the press.

Senator Dodd also has a vacation cottage in Ireland, valued at $660,000, which has been subject of a Senate ethics complaint. The Senate complaint mentions that this vacation cottage might have been a gift. From who it fails to mention.

Senator Dodd isn’t the only one though….

Senator Rockefeller, D-W.Va., reported $15,001 to $50,000 in capital gains for his wife from the sale of a stake in Athenahealth Inc., a business services company that helps medical providers with billing and clinical operations.

Rockefeller is honorary chairman of the Alliance for Health Reform, a Washington nonprofit whose board includes representatives from the UnitedHealth Group health insurance company; AFL-CIO labor union; the AARP, which sells health insurance; St. John Health, a nonprofit health system that includes seven hospitals and 125 medical facilities in southeast Michigan; CIGNA Corp., an employer-sponsored benefits company; and the United Hospital Fund of New York.

Senator Harkin, D-Iowa, has a joint ownership stake in health-related stocks. Harkin and his wife, Ruth Raduenz, own shares of drug makers Amgen and Genentech, Inc., each stake valued at $1,001 to $15,000; Their largest health care holding, Johnson & Johnson, was valued at $50,001 to $100,000.

Is anyone else as outraged as I am? These Senators who are responsible for writing what could possibly be the most far reaching piece of healthcare legislation to date, who supposedly are trying to protect Joe Citizen, are in the pocket of the health care industry. Sure, more Americans will probably get healthcare coverage, and the Democratic party will claim success; however, rest assured we will all pay for it, most likely in the form of higher taxes. According to a report released just today by the non-partisan congressional budget office, this healthcare plan will cost an estimated $1 trillion dollars by 2015. Wait a minute, we already have a record budget deficit don’t we? Under this plan, the defecit will nearly double once again, paid for by us, the taxpayer. President Obama has expressed his extreme support of the bill moving through Congress, and is expected to sign it when it reaches his desk.

It seems to me that these Senators have no other interest at heart, than to line their own pockets and protect their investments, all the while screwing us all over.

Be sure to leave comments to this story!

— Clayton

Not ANOTHER False Prophet

I decided to post the full video of John Voight’s (Angelina Jolie’s father) speech he gave the other night against Obama. While he brings up some important points and facts, I feel that his message is lost at the end of the speech. Voight mentions of Obama’s failed policies, his radicalism etc; but then he calls Obama a “false prophet” at the end. Check out the video for yourselves, it runs just about 9 minutes total.

I am so tired of hearing the “false prophet”, Antichrist talk. All this does is further portray the GOP as a bunch of old, angry, paranoid men; and as a result hurts the party as a whole. This sort of comment pretty much causes whatever point you are trying to make, to be lost. Remember the presidential election last year? You know, the one where the GOP was characterized as a bunch of angry old white men over and over again.

Let us know what you think! Be sure to leave a comment…

— Clayton

It’s The Economy Stupid

I recently read a story from CNN regarding the economy and President Obama’s progress at fixing it, almost as if CNN had already deemed his economic policy a failure. Which got me thinking….

President Obama’s economic plan that was set in motion in the first day’s of his presidency was supposed to rescue us all. Whether or not his plan will have any effect on the economy will takes months, if not years to judge accuratley. In the beginning of Obama’s presidency he stated several times that his plan would “create” X number of jobs; however, it wasn’t just a few days until both Democrats and Republicans lambasted the President over whether that was realistic. Obama was quick to re-phrase his statements stating now that his economic plan will “create or save” 150,000 jobs.

Creating or saving 150,000 jobs sounds great and all, but no time frame is given for this. 150,000 jobs over the next month? The next year? By saying he “created or saved 150,000 jobs”, it is nearly impossible to tell if that ever really happened.

I also remembered back in March or April when Timothy Geithner, Obama’s

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner

Treasury Secretary, stated that the administrations economic plan would “create or save 150,000 jobs” and that the nationwide unemployment rate would not top 8%. For Geithner to make such a promise is despicable, a person of his background should know better, should know that such a promise is doomed to be broken. Flash forward to last week when the federal government released information on how the economy was fairing. Since this economic plan was put in action, the United States has lost 6 million jobs, and the unemployment rate has soared to 9.4%.  Where are these 150,000 jobs you created or saved Mr. President?

I know what some of you are thinking, Bush is the reason we are in this mess. Despite what the media would lead you to believe, the President has basically no control over the economy. The President and government can enact broad, general economic policies; but that is not going to have much of an effect overall. Try as one might, you can’t blame the burst of the internet bubble in 1990’s on Clinton; much the same way you can’t blame Hoover for the Great Depression or Roosevelt for ending it.

So as far as Obama’s plan to pull us out of this, I hope it works; I just have realistic expectations of what to expect. And for Mr. Geithner, please think before you make promises you can’t keep to the American people, they will thank you for it.

The point of this editorial is to get individuals to think for themselves instead of listening to what CNN, Fox, or your newspaper tells them. The government is not going to save you, it can’t. This recession along with nearly all others is global, one government cannot fix it. The economy will eventually pick up much the same way it has in the past; demand for goods will increase, more jobs will be created (by companies, not by the government) to make said goods, and people will spend more of their income.

— Clayton

UPDATE – This editorial is not meant to be anti-Obama. It is meant simply to make citizens realize that the government’s effect on the economy is negligible. Every administration must appear to be working on the “problem” for the sake of public opinion. This is where President George W Bush made a series of mistakes, in my opinion, and thus lost the public opinion battle, he seemed at times to not be working toward a solution.

— Clayton

Rev. Jeremiah Wright and “Them Jews”

In an interview that the DailyPress.com did with Jeremiah Wright, President Obama’s former pastor, Wright states that “Them Jews aren’t going to let him talk to me. I told my baby daughter, that he’ll talk to me in five years when he’s a lame duck, or in eight years when he’s out of office. …”

Rev. Wright went on to say that Obama has made bad choices by choosing to not speak with him, choosing instead to listen to those around him.

Personally I’m glad that Obama has pretty much disowned this hate monger.  I know we all remember his “God !@*% America tirade that was widely publicized in the media during the election.

Check out the full article from the dailypress.com

— Clayton

What is Common Sense?

This blog get’s it’s name from the famous pamphlet titled Common Sense written by Thomas Paine, and published in 1776 during the American Revolution.

Common Sense

In Common Sense, Paine outlines reasons for breaking from British rule at a time when most colonists were still undecided about independence. To explain and support his reasoning he uses what he refers to as “Common Sense.”

Through the years since Common Sense was first published, many great minds have studied both the man and the various works for which he is responsible. The likes of Abraham Lincoln, Thomas Edison, and Napoleon Bonaparte all studied Paine’s works. Most recently Barack Obama quoted Thomas Paine during his inauguration speech in January.

It is my goal, through this blog to express my “common sense” views regarding todays political, social, and religious landscape. Though it is not my intent to anger anyone with differing views, it is my intent to have individuals critically think about the positions they hold, as well as open their eyes to the world around them.

For those interested in reading more about Thomas Paine please see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Paine

-Clayton